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Sunday, April 19, 2009

Fringe Benefits

We were talking about a week ago—I don’t remember about what but it was probably about how lame we were that we had no plans for Easter break, which was a week and a half long—and I mentioned to Andrew that my favorite vacation was probably the trip we went on with his family to San Diego last summer. I liked it for a lot of reasons:

1) Karen rented a condo that was (almost) right on the beach. I love the beach and we spent all day there, often.

1a) I don’t really like staying in hotels. I hate the idea of someone snooping through my stuff, especially someone I don’t know, even if they are only cleaning up after me. That was another nice thing about staying at the condo.

2) We ate in a lot, and I didn’t even help with much of the cooking because I was usually off nursing Rachel or putting her to bed while dinner preparations were going on. I don’t really like eating out (every once in a while is nice but I like eating at home better).

3) Our schedule was very relaxed. We could take off to visit my relatives or simply hang out on the beach. We did plan a few excursions, like the temple trip, Lego Land, and Sea World…but the whole itinerary was simple and relaxed.

4) Andrew’s parents paid for the whole thing. I don’t think this point needs any further explanation.

There are more reasons, but I think you get the idea. I liked that vacation set-up.

So, Andrew and I talked about that and I thought that was that. It was just something we talked about because it came up in conversation and I could probably forget about having another vacation like that for a long while because we’re stuck in Egypt and things like that don’t happen when you’re stuck in Egypt, without money, and are far, far away from both your family and Disneyland.

A few days later (maybe even the next day…I can’t remember) Andrew waltzed in through the front door waving a set of keys in the air triumphantly. He had just returned home from tutoring.

“What’s up?” I asked him.

“You know how you were saying that your favorite vacation was at the condo on the beach…?” he trailed off and jingled the keys.

“Yes,” I said. Of course I remembered.

“I’m holding the keys to a condo on a beach.”

“You’re kidding!”

Turns out he wasn’t kidding. The family he tutors for rents a condo at Stella di Mare near Ain Sokhna on the Red Sea. And, get this, they hardly ever use it! They haven’t been since October!

After asking what our plans were for the break and finding that we had none, Mr. Rose ran around his house producing keys, paperwork, sheets, and towels. He told us to go “check on” the condo for them, pay any bills that needed to be paid (which he’d reimburse us for), and have a good time.

That? Totally rocks!

So that’s how we ended up spending 3 days at a beach house on the Red Sea. And since we’ve been invited to visit as often as we would like, I hope it’s the first of many times.